Joe Sofranko left Cincinnati for Los Angeles after high school to become an actor.

He didn’t expect to be writing, directing and producing. But life has this funny way. And Sofranko has taken his and run with it.

His new series of half-hour shows, “Complete Works,” launched on Hulu Wednesday, William Shakespeare’s 450th birthday. It’s a five-part sitcom – part wicked, part witty, part sweet – based loosely on some of Sofranko’s experiences. It’s co-produced, co-written and co-directed by Sofranko. He also stars.

Sofranko plays Hal Evans, Shakespeare-obsessed since age 4, a competitor in the American Shakespeare Competition. In short, the six finalists in the series all go a little nuts competing with each other.

It was, in part, inspired by Sofranko’s own experience competing in the National Shakespeare Competition at Lincoln Center in New York in 2004 (he won) and his time with YoungArts, a national group for artistically talented high school students.

Sofranko, a 2005 Walnut Hills High School co-valedictorian, made a name for himself in theater here at a young age. He won Overture Awards in 2003 and 2005. He worked with Playhouse in the Park, Clear Stage Cincinnati, CCM Prep, the Children’s Theatre, and had a long list of Shakespeare roles in high school.

It has taken nearly four years to see “Complete Works” to this point. He wrote the earliest drafts of a feature-film length script in 2010, a year out of school at the University of Southern California and looking for a way to get into the Screen Actor’s Guild. (He realized later he was already eligible for something he’d done in Cincinnati.)

Shooting was done in 2012 and it was edited into 14 web-episodes. Once it got to Hulu, the team re-edited it as five sitcom-length shows.

His main partners in the project were girlfriend Lili Fuller (they met at YoungArts and became friends at the USC) and Adam North. North co-wrote and co-directed and Fuller stars with Sofranko in the series.

“We went into it not knowing what we were doing. We were actors, but for the most part we were pretty inexperienced,” Sofranko says. “Over the last few years, I feel like I went to grad school ... in filmmaking. You figure it out, you learn and you make mistakes.”

They raised money, $40,000 to produce the series, some of it by digging into their own pockets. They had help along the way (often for little to no pay): Vicki Lewis (“NewsRadio”) appears, Xander Lott mixed sound and Michael Kramer composed music. The final sound mix was done over a week in the same Sony studio as 2009 Best Picture “The Hurt Locker.”

“I went off to USC with the thought that I would be an actor and only an actor,” Sofranko says. Since graduating from USC, he’s done some small acting jobs, performed with an a capella group on Nick Lachey’s “The Sing Off,” done some commercials, and done a little catering on the side to earn money.

“I’m still a struggling actor,” Sofranko says.

He’s got the bug for more than acting now. He discovered he loves being part of an ensemble, and on the ground floor of the creative process.

“A lot of time in the film and TV world, when you’re the actor, you’re the last one to know what’s going on, and you’re the first one to leave,” Sofranko says.

But it’s been more than a learning experience. His production company with Fuller and North, Kingdom for a Horse Productions, has been asked to pitch ideas for TV pilots. Together they’re working on two TV scripts, two feature film ideas and a couple of web series.

“If ‘Complete Works’ is nothing more than a calling card, that’s still amazing. It’s going to be a really big step for establishing credibility and attention in an industry where it’s very competitive – a million writers and actors begging for their work to be seen. Hopefully ‘Complete Works’ will allow my next script to be read and opened.”

That doesn’t mean Sofranko is done with theater.

“I really do miss doing theater,” he says. “That’s why I did a show about doing theater. Theater was my first passion and always will be.”

Over time – he’s 27 now – he’s even more grateful for his Cincinnati experiences and teachers, all of whom had so much to do with where he is now.

• Tom Peters, now at Summit Country Day School, his theater director at Walnut Hills. “He opened my eyes to how much possibility there was in Shakespeare,” Sofranko says.

• Gina Cerimele-Mechley, a private acting coach, who helped him prepare for the National Shakespeare Competition at Lincoln Center in New York.

• And Barbara Stewart, an English teacher at Walnut Hills. Over the phone, he reads a personal inscription written in “The Essential Shakespeare Handbook,” a gift from Stewart that he keeps handy. It was in Stewart’s eighth-grade class that he first learned Shakespeare – either “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” or “Much Ado About Nothing.”

“I definitely owe them so much. I wouldn’t be here today if it weren’t for those people. ... I feel removed from them because I’m all the way out in Los Angeles, but I still think about them.”